In Interpreting Young Adult Literature: Literary Theory in the Secondary Classroom, Moore (1997) advocates for the use of Jefferson & Roby’s (1986) Five-Question Framework for Literary Theory Exploration when analyzing texts with regard to the interplay among writer, reader, text, and world. This can be a helpful framework for any ELA teacher!
1. How does the theory define the literary qualities of the text?
[TEXT ONLY]
2. What relation does the theory propose between the text and the author?
[TEXT and AUTHOR]
3. What role does the theory ascribe to the reader?
[READER / ROLE OF READER]
4. How does the theory view the relationship between text and reality?
[TEXT and REALITY]
5. What status does the theory give to the medium of the text, and to the language of the text?
[MEDIUM OF TEXT and LANGUAGE OF TEXT]
Source: Jefferson, A., and Robey, D. (1986). Introduction to Modern Literary Theory: A Comparative Introduction, 2nd ed., 7-23. Totawa, NJ: Barnes and Noble.
In Interpreting Young Adult Literature: Literary Theory in the Secondary Classroom, Moore (1997) advocates for the use of Jefferson & Roby’s (1986) Five-Question Framework for Literary Theory Exploration when analyzing texts with regard to the interplay among writer, reader, text, and world. This can be a helpful framework for any ELA teacher!
1. How does the theory define the literary qualities of the text?
2. What relation does the theory propose between the text and the author?
3. What role does the theory ascribe to the reader?
4. How does the theory view the relationship between text and reality?
5. What status does the theory give to the medium of the text, and to the language of the text?
Source: Jefferson, A., and Robey, D. (1986). Introduction to Modern Literary Theory: A Comparative Introduction, 2nd ed., 7-23. Totawa, NJ: Barnes and Noble.